Method and apparatus for printing
AssigneeXerox Corporation
InventorsAaron Michael Stuckey, Karl Edwin Kurz
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Aspects of the disclosure can provide a method for replacing a customer replaceable unit (CRU) in a printing system. The method can include determining a historic usage pattern for a CRU during a usage of the CRU, calculating a remaining time for the CRU based on the historic usage pattern, and signaling a user for ordering a new CRC when the remaining time for the CRU is substantially equivalent to a pre-determined value.
Claims14
A method for replacing a customer replaceable unit (CRU) in a printing system, comprising:
- determining a historic usage pattern for a photoreceptor during a usage of the photoreceptor, the historic usage pattern for the photoreceptor being determined as an amount of use of the photoreceptor per a unit of time, a usage attribute is an imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor;
- periodically measuring the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor according to saturation charging;
- plotting the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor as a function of time between periodic measurements to obtain a resultant plot;
- calculating a remaining time for the photoreceptor based on a relationship between the imaging layer thickness and time from the resultant plot;
- and
- signaling a user for ordering a new photoreceptor when the remaining time for the photoreceptor is substantially equivalent to a pre-determined value.
A printing system, comprising:
- a photoreceptor that is user replaceable;
- a monitor device that (a) measures an initial imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor, (b) periodically measures the imaging layer thickness according to saturation charging and (c) plots the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor as a function of time between periodic measurements to obtain a resultant plot;
- and
- a controller module configured to (1) determine a historic usage pattern for the photoreceptor based on the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor, the historic usage pattern for the photoreceptor being determined as a change in the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor per a unit of time, (2) calculate a remaining time for the photoreceptor based on a relationship between the imaging layer thickness and time from the resultant plot;
- and (3) signal a user for ordering a new photoreceptor when the remaining time for the photoreceptor is substantially equivalent to a pre-determined value.
A non-transitory computer readable medium storing program instructions for causing a controller to perform a customer replaceable unit (CRU) optimization method, comprising:
- determining a historic usage pattern for a photoreceptor during a usage of the photoreceptor, the historic usage pattern for the photoreceptor being determined as an amount of use of the photoreceptor per a unit of time;
- periodically measuring an imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor according to saturation charging;
- plotting the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor as a function of time between periodic measurements to obtain a resultant plot;
- calculating a remaining time for the photoreceptor based on a relationship between the imaging layer thickness of the photoreceptor and time from the resultant plot;
- and
- signaling a user for ordering a new photoreceptor when the remaining time for the photoreceptor is substantially equivalent to a pre-determined value.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.